The field of the present invention relates generally to the energy efficient and economical elimination of pollutants exhausted from a contained gaseous pollutant source and, more particularly, to an apparatus and method of virtually eliminating or significantly reducing pollutants exhausted from piston and rotary type internal combustion engines and from other sources that produce pollutants through the combustion of petroleum or organic fuels.
Attention is called to U.S. Pat. Nos.: 3,750,401; 4,785,748; 4,915,038; 5,014,509; 3,074,469; 5,052,178; 4,944,153; 4,887,426; 5,044,158; 4,576,617; 4,450,682; 4,987,738; 5,063,737; 4,902,487; 4,838,067; 4,672,809; 4,504,294; 4,725, 411; 4,651,524; 4,663,934; 4,625,511; Re. 33,118; 4,597,262; 4,974,414; 4,711,087; 4,615,173; 4,630,438; 4,427,423; 4,415,344; 4,813,233; and 4,604,868.
Reducing air pollution, particularly pollution from engine emissions and noxious odors from sources other than engine emissions, has become a strong environmental objective both in the United States and around the world. Because of worldwide tightening of pollution emission standards, inventors have continually tried to invent devices and methods that will meet these increasingly stringent standards. Many previous references that relate to methods and apparatus for incinerating hazardous materials and wastes, first trap particulates in a filtering device and then periodically burn the trapped particles to clean the filtering device, rather than continuously eliminating the particulates and other pollution. Other devices that attempt to directly eliminate pollution from exhaust using a canular like combustion chamber fail to significantly reduce pollutants because the device itself produces large amounts of pollutants and may be energy inefficient.
There remains a need for a device that can continuously eliminate virtually all compounds such as oxides of nitrogen, hydrocarbons, carbon monoxide, odors and organic and inorganic particulates from pollution exhausted from a contained pollution source, including combustion engines, while maximizing its energy efficiency.